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ENGL 306: Shakespeare

Course Aims and Objectives
Ben Jonson claimed of Shakespeare ‘he was not of an age but for all time.’ and 2012 has been a year in which the Bard’s work has been celebrated as an icon of both British identity and internationalism. This course gives you an opportunity to interrogate Jonson’s claim by looking at a range of lesser and better known texts with reference to the historical moments of their original production and in the light of current theoretical and theatrical reinterpretations. We begin by exploring the relationship between page and stage: the written and performed texts of Shakespeare. Week by week, we will study a selection of comedies, tragedies, histories and poems, investigating Shakespeare’s manipulation of genre, within a broadly chronological framework. Intersecting with this historicist base, you will be invited to consider how the texts resonate emotionally, politically and intellectually for readers, viewers and listeners today. You will be introduced to a range of critical approaches and expected to engage actively in critical debates in seminar discussions and presentations. The course will also make reference to productions on stage and screen as critical interpretations of the texts. There will be opportunities to explore the ways the texts make active use of language (verse, prose, rhyme, rhythm) and theatrical languages (costume, stage positions) to generate meaning. The plays set for seminars are those listed in the lecture programme. The set text of Shakespeare’s Complete Works is the Norton Shakespeare (International Student Edition) (2011). You must have a copy of the Complete Works as we will be referring to work across the canon and you should have this edition.

Assessment
1 x 3,000 word essay (40%), plus 1 x exam preparation presentation (unassessed); 1 x 3-hour final examination (60%). Details of the presentation will be announced at the start of the Lent Term.

Submission deadlines
Essay = 12 noon, Monday Week 10/Term 1.

Contact:
One lecture and one seminar per week

Learning Outcomes:
On successful completion of the course, you should have:

• acquired an enriched understanding of Shakespeare’s historical context and a grasp of the ways in which this shaped his plays.
• have a perception of the place of the Shakespearean theatre in Elizabethan and Jacobean politics and its importance as the sight of struggle over interpretations of the state, the family, gender and identity.
• acquired an informed idea of the actual design and conventions of Shakespeare’s playhouse, and an awareness of how these determined his texts.
• become familiar with contemporary critical debates about the plays, and to be prepared to apply theoretical concepts to analysis of them.
• developed an appreciation of how Shakespeare’s drama continues to be a global force in the present, especially through its representation in cinematic forms.

Set Texts:
See Lecture Programme for the plays and poems we will focus on.

Essential text:
The Norton Shakespeare (International Student Edition), ed. Stephen Greenblatt, Walter Cohen, Jean E. Howard and Katherine Eisaman Maus (New York and London: W. W. Norton and Company, 2008, reprinted 2011)

For further reading and details of performances and screenings, see the course Moodle site.

Lecturers: AGF = Prof Alison Findlay; LOB = Dr Liz Oakley Brown; HH = Dr Hilary Hinds

Lecture / Seminar Programme

Term 1

Term 2

Revision Lecture Week 22 (AGF)

Back to: ENGL 304

Froward to: ENGL 308

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